This is how I go forward with my music - the real story from November 2017 and towards the album release but it took Volume 2 to get the whole way there. Creating, editing and mixing music is a complicated effort but loads of fun.
For all you who wa...
I love writing about how to make music & think positively while doing it, but sometimes I have to balance all that out & give a more realistic view of the new music business. Here is the dark side.
Today I am on a rant today.
I agree with Mr. Musk. What is the point of sitting cooped up in a studio for years, pouring your heart into something that costs tons more to produce than you'll ever get reimbursed for? It's not just Grimes that's getting screwed, it is every single indie musician out there.
Like flies in a lamp: I think that many indie musicians are going to hop off the "I can mix in the box and make it big" bandwagon after a few years. Mark my words - You are going to see people giving up and dropping off like flies in the lamp. They get attracted to the music making buzz (because it is doable on a modest budget) but get burned when they finally get it done - because most will find that they don't get the recognition or payback needed in order to continue with the next project. It's extremely frustrating.
Newbie musicians of my age are almost non existent. They won't get the recognition or promotion (without paying for it) because they are neither young or beautiful. And because there is no financial gain in it for most of us, then the only reason to continue is if you have a deep desire to change the world through a calling you believe you have (We'll see how long we last with that). You can't be in this for the money if you have your head screwed on straight.
We don't get paid much: As you can see, we indies don't get paid much per stream. The real money is in synchronisation - selling music for use in tv, advertisements and film. X-box is the most generous at about two and a half cents per play. YouTube pays a mere, almost invisible, portion in comparison and Spotify is somewhere in between. The fact that people can rip your music from YouTube easily is offset by the fact that most musician's music is discovered there through their music videos. (Don't forget that after that amount is paid into your CDBaby account, they take a little chunk and then a whole bunch goes to pay taxes).
Gone are the days when a fan would by your album as a CD for ten bucks. It happens every once in a while that they do buy a CD at a concert, but to create a minimum amount of CDs (500 ex) is expensive and you may never get that investment back again. (it takes selling selling about 60 CDs for the full market price to break even.)
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It is easier today, now, more than ever, to make music cheaply compared to how it was, say twenty years ago. Now, anyone and their brother can create and post music on major streaming services without any quality checks - there is a lot of junk out there among the jewels. This makes people sceptical - they stick to the pla
The only way to make money on streaming is through volume. If you get many plays, you will get many small crumbs that add up to a loaf of bread. Most of us starve. That is the awesome truth. But only about 10% of all the millions of music that are posted on streaming sites is ever played more than a few times. So what is the point of doing music at all? Because we want to change the world for the better. This is the same old story through the ages that has plagued musicians since time began. Everyone wants to hear great music but no one wants to pay for it.
I hope that someone of Elon Musk's standing might just start a streaming service that pays us more per play and gives it subscribers a better listener's experience. We can always hope...
